ABF | My 10-year Abf Anniversary

[LTLAnonymous]

In another life, sometime this fall would have been my 10-year anniversary at ABF. I'm being purposely vague, simply for privacy reasons.

I left from ABF very frustrated. The 2013 contract effectively killed the ABF I knew from my first two years. The company asked for too much, and the union rolled over and gave it up freely.

Of course the highlights of the contract were the 7% pay cut and vacation giveback. Those were the reasons most employees became disgruntled.

But honestly? ABF could have kept me around if I just could have gotten a bid. The union allowing the company to decrease the percentage of freight that had to be set aside for bid runs is ultimately the reason I had to leave.

At my terminal, it was generally two years before you got a bid. Right around the time I was just on the verge of getting one, the threshold increased to five years.

All I ever wanted was some normalcy. Being on call 24/7 for 6 days in a row, living in hotels, barely sleeping, feeling unhealthy... I could do it for two years. But not five.

And yet I stuck around for two more years, getting more and more angry. Throwing my phone every time it rang with a work call. Taking mental health days off with the help of a doctor who was concerned about my level of fatigue and constant back pain.

Ironically? Right at five years, I decided to tell them to take their bid and shove it.

I had always heard the horror stories about how hard UPS was to work for, but at least they were home everyday. I threw them an application basically on my way out of the industry, and they called the next day. I had a job a few weeks later.

I did four more years on-call before finally getting my first permanent bid run last year. Starting out here was difficult, and it wasn't a lot of money, but this place is so much easier to work for than ABF, I have zero regrets.

This fall I go to top pay scale at UPS.

So at the end of the day, I guess I would just like to thank ABF. I might be celebrating 10 years there right now, laughing at UPS drivers for all the rules and micromanagement they have to put up with... and also being completely clueless about the reality.

And on a little side note? My back pain is completely gone. I guess stress was a factor.

 

[Diggger86]

It’s a tough call either way. I want to go back to a union carrier but I cannot go back to living by the phone. Glad you made out good in the long run.

 

[canaryinthemine]

In another life, sometime this fall would have been my 10-year anniversary at ABF. I'm being purposely vague, simply for privacy reasons.

I left from ABF very frustrated. The 2013 contract effectively killed the ABF I knew from my first two years. The company asked for too much, and the union rolled over and gave it up freely.

Of course the highlights of the contract were the 7% pay cut and vacation giveback. Those were the reasons most employees became disgruntled.

But honestly? ABF could have kept me around if I just could have gotten a bid. The union allowing the company to decrease the percentage of freight that had to be set aside for bid runs is ultimately the reason I had to leave.

At my terminal, it was generally two years before you got a bid. Right around the time I was just on the verge of getting one, the threshold increased to five years.

All I ever wanted was some normalcy. Being on call 24/7 for 6 days in a row, living in hotels, barely sleeping, feeling unhealthy... I could do it for two years. But not five.

And yet I stuck around for two more years, getting more and more angry. Throwing my phone every time it rang with a work call. Taking mental health days off with the help of a doctor who was concerned about my level of fatigue and constant back pain.

Ironically? Right at five years, I decided to tell them to take their bid and shove it.

I had always heard the horror stories about how hard UPS was to work for, but at least they were home everyday. I threw them an application basically on my way out of the industry, and they called the next day. I had a job a few weeks later.

I did four more years on-call before finally getting my first permanent bid run last year. Starting out here was difficult, and it wasn't a lot of money, but this place is so much easier to work for than ABF, I have zero regrets.

This fall I go to top pay scale at UPS.

So at the end of the day, I guess I would just like to thank ABF. I might be celebrating 10 years there right now, laughing at UPS drivers for all the rules and micromanagement they have to put up with... and also being completely clueless about the reality.

And on a little side note? My back pain is completely gone. I guess stress was a factor.

An amazing testimony..In my former Local,..#30, out of Jeannette, Pa...we had over 1100 UPS employees from the New Stanton, Pa. facility.


The Pay and Vacation cut in 2013,,..was one of the.....stupidest, most short-sighted,...greedy,....and ignorant thing that management could've done...Prior to that turd-in-a-punchbowl,.....ABF had probably excellent Employee relations,........

Hiring upper management from outside ABF is probably what soured that relationship........But, Upper Management would NEVER admit that.......Must be an Employee Attitude Problem......

And, of course,.....lackadaisical and incompetent "leadership" from the Teamsters didn't help.....Pay cut in the middle of a Driver Shortage?....Allow YRC to quit paying pension payments?.........Break up the NMFA into little components with ...little clout?


Good Luck to you, Brother! I hope your pension is straightened out if you're in CSPF,.......I personally think a solution will be found,...after the election......

 

[Trippleswest]

In another life, sometime this fall would have been my 10-year anniversary at ABF. I'm being purposely vague, simply for privacy reasons.

I left from ABF very frustrated. The 2013 contract effectively killed the ABF I knew from my first two years. The company asked for too much, and the union rolled over and gave it up freely.

Of course the highlights of the contract were the 7% pay cut and vacation giveback. Those were the reasons most employees became disgruntled.

But honestly? ABF could have kept me around if I just could have gotten a bid. The union allowing the company to decrease the percentage of freight that had to be set aside for bid runs is ultimately the reason I had to leave.

At my terminal, it was generally two years before you got a bid. Right around the time I was just on the verge of getting one, the threshold increased to five years.

All I ever wanted was some normalcy. Being on call 24/7 for 6 days in a row, living in hotels, barely sleeping, feeling unhealthy... I could do it for two years. But not five.

And yet I stuck around for two more years, getting more and more angry. Throwing my phone every time it rang with a work call. Taking mental health days off with the help of a doctor who was concerned about my level of fatigue and constant back pain.

Ironically? Right at five years, I decided to tell them to take their bid and shove it.

I had always heard the horror stories about how hard UPS was to work for, but at least they were home everyday. I threw them an application basically on my way out of the industry, and they called the next day. I had a job a few weeks later.

I did four more years on-call before finally getting my first permanent bid run last year. Starting out here was difficult, and it wasn't a lot of money, but this place is so much easier to work for than ABF, I have zero regrets.

This fall I go to top pay scale at UPS.

So at the end of the day, I guess I would just like to thank ABF. I might be celebrating 10 years there right now, laughing at UPS drivers for all the rules and micromanagement they have to put up with... and also being completely clueless about the reality.

And on a little side note? My back pain is completely gone. I guess stress was a factor.

Congratulations sounds like a good move.

 

[LTLAnonymous]

An amazing testimony..In my former Local,..#30, out of Jeannette, Pa...we had over 1100 UPS employees from the New Stanton, Pa. facility.


The Pay and Vacation cut in 2013,,..was one of the.....stupidest, most short-sighted,...greedy,....and ignorant thing that management could've done...Prior to that turd-in-a-punchbowl,.....ABF had probably excellent Employee relations,........

Hiring upper management from outside ABF is probably what soured that relationship........But, Upper Management would NEVER admit that.......Must be an Employee Attitude Problem......

And, of course,.....lackadaisical and incompetent "leadership" from the Teamsters didn't help.....Pay cut in the middle of a Driver Shortage?....Allow YRC to quit paying pension payments?.........Break up the NMFA into little components with ...little clout?


Good Luck to you, Brother! I hope your pension is straightened out if you're in CSPF,.......I personally think a solution will be found,...after the election......

Fortunately, I am not in Central States. My pension fund is healthy. I really hope someone figures out something for those poor people.